


Better Brother

by JCapasso



Category: The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-10
Updated: 2020-06-10
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:28:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 12,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24634576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JCapasso/pseuds/JCapasso
Summary: What if Elena had heard Damon's side of the story first? What if she had seen a little deeper behind his masks and realized that he wasn't nearly the villain he was made out to be?Starts from 1x19 Miss Mystic Falls
Relationships: Elena Gilbert/Damon Salvatore
Comments: 2
Kudos: 63





	1. Chapter 1

Elena was more than a little nervous. She didn’t really want to be doing this pageant in the first place. Especially with Stefan struggling right now. Unfortunately, she had missed her chance to back out and now she was stuck. She was trying to get up the nerve to change into her dress when Damon slipped into the room. “Hey!” she startled. “You can’t be back here.”

“We need to talk,” Damon said seriously. 

“Does it have to be right now?” Elena asked pointedly, waving her dress at him in a hint to leave. 

Damon just ignored her though. “Normally, I would have a very different outlook on what I’m about to tell you, but since it could really inconvenience me, I’ll…squeal,” he said uncomfortably. 

“What are you talking about?” Elena asked resisting the urge to roll her eyes at his dramatics. 

“Stefan’s still drinking human blood,” Damon said gravely.

“What?” Elena asked stunned and hurt. 

“Yeah,” Damon shrugged. “A month ago I would have rejoiced, but with the council back on the alert it is /not/ a good time for Stefan to fly off the handle.” 

Elena shook her head. She didn’t believe him. Didn’t want to believe him. “I know he’s been a little edgy, but he said that was normal,” she protested. 

“He has a fridge full of stolen bloodbank contraband in the house,” he told her firmly. 

Elena felt all her breath leave her body, but made it to the couch to sit as she breathed out, “Oh my god.” 

“He has no idea what normal is. His entire existence isn’t normal. Normal to a vampire is drinking human blood, but he’s spent all this time fighting it when he should have been learning how to control it and now it’s controlling him instead.” 

“I-I can’t believe this…I mean, it’s Stefan that we’re talking about here.” She was still trying to wrap her mind around this new information and reconcile it with the man she knew. 

“Stefan on human blood, Elena. He’ll do anything. He’ll say anything. Because he’s not gonna want to stop,” Damon explained as clearly as he could. If he was going to pull his brother off the edge he was going to need her help. She needed to understand how serious this was. “Trust me.” 

Elena got back up and started pacing. “This is all my fault. I’m the one who fed him the blood in the first place…”

Before Damon could dispute that, they were interrupted by Stefan. “What’s going on here?” he asked as he stepped into the room. 

“Just…filling Elena in on your…extracurricular activities,” Damon said hesitantly. 

“What are you talking about?” Stefan tried to play dumb and confused. 

Elena wasn’t going to let him get away with it though. “I know about the blood, Stefan.” 

“I’m gonna…uh…I’ll be downstairs…drinking,” Damon said uncomfortably, making his escape. 

“I was gonna tell you,” Stefan tried to placate her. 

“When?” Elena asked, crossing her arms. 

“I’m fine,” Stefan assured her as he walked over with his arms open. “I’m fine. The blood…it doesn’t change anything.” 

“It’s changing you,” Elena told him. 

“Why? Because I kept it a secret from you?” Stefan asked amusedly. “Come on, Elena. Look. Given the way you’re reacting right now, can you really blame me for doing that?”

Elena could not believe he just went there. “Are you hearing yourself right now?” she asked incredulously. “You’ve been stealing blood and lying and you say that everything is fine? Everything’s not fine, Stefan.” 

“So what? So you and Damon suddenly have everything all figured out then,” Stefan scoffed. 

“It’s not about Damon. It’s about what’s happening to you,” she snapped. 

“I know,” Stefan said desperately. “And I’m telling you that I’m fine. I’m fine. Please. Come on, Elena. I thought you…you believed in me.”

Elena just blinked at him. That was a low blow. Emotional blackmail at it’s finest. Not something that she would have expected from Stefan. She was almost glad of the interruption when Mrs. Lockwood sent Stefan down to wait with the other escorts. This was turning into a nightmare. 

She changed quickly and headed out to wait with the other girls on the landing, trying to forget about this whole thing for now. When she heard her name called, she took a deep breath and started heading down the stairs. When she didn’t see Stefan there waiting for her she faltered a bit in her steps as she felt the embarrassment washing over her. Was he seriously going to just stand her up like this? In front of the entire town? It was both relief and worry that she felt when she saw Damon slip into his place. 

Damon looked around worriedly for Stefan when he and Elena were announced but couldn’t find him anywhere. When he saw the look on Elena’s face when she realized he wasn’t there, there was nothing else he could do but try and fix it the only way he could. He moved over and stepped into Stefan’s place, watching her come down the stairs and felt his breath quicken as she took his hand. “Where’s Stefan?” she whispered worriedly. 

“I don’t know,” Damon whispered back, as he led her gracefully outside, taking their places for the dance. 

“What are we going to do?” she asked as she curtsied to him. 

“Right now, we just have to get through this,” he said with a tight smile of solidarity. Then he would find his brother and wring his neck. The last thing he needed was to be put in the position of caring even more than he already did about Elena Gilbert. As the dance started, he completed the steps expertly, trying not to get lost in her eyes, and catching himself a few times. 

Elena was surprised, not only at how seriously Damon was taking this, but also at how skilled he was. She had danced this with Stefan in rehearsals and he was good, but more precise and wooden. Damon did the dance perfectly and with a grace that she wouldn’t have expected from him. She found it easy to follow his lead as they danced around the floor and even found herself enjoying it. 

It was over before she knew it and then it was time to get back to reality and find Stefan. When Damon pulled her aside to tell her about the bathroom scene and that Amber was missing, she couldn’t believe that he would go that far. When Damon didn’t bother to argue and just stressed the importance of finding him, she realized that Damon knew him better than she did right now, and didn’t even want to think about what that meant. 

Finding Stefan feeding on Amber like that was a dose of cold water. More than that though was the way that he acted like a spooked animal. She was taken aback at the way that Damon talked gently and moved slowly, trying to calm him down before Stefan attacked him. It was like he didn’t even see Damon. Or her. He was completely out of control, and that was what scared her. Not the blood drinking, but the lack of control. 

Once Stefan had taken off into the woods, she could see the frustration on Damon’s face as he looked back and forth between the girl and the way Stefan ran before he pulled out his phone. Once he called Liz he went over to Elena and Bonnie to rehearse their story before she got there. Bonnie took a little convincing, but eventually she lied for Stefan. Elena didn’t want to go back to the party, but she didn’t have much choice. 

Elena was more than relieved when the party was over and she called Damon on her way to the Salvatore house. “We need to lock him up until this passes,” she said firmly. 

“It’s not going to be easy, Elena,” Damon told her with a sigh. He just wanted this awful day to be over with, but it seemed like it wasn’t to be.

“I know, but we have to try. This is all my fault…”

“No, Elena. It’s not,” Damon said clearly. 

“But I’m the one who fed him the blood…”

“To save his life,” Damon pointed out. “He’s the one who didn’t stop there. This is what Stefan does. He falls off the wagon every few decades, and leaves a wake of devastation in his path and then the guilt overwhelms him and he’s back on. This has nothing to do with you.” 

Elena took a few deep breaths for calm as she took in Damon’s words. She wasn’t entire sure that she believed them, but couldn’t deny that it made sense. She had read enough about addiction issues with everything Jeremy was going through and it sounded like the same thing. She didn’t know if she could deal with someone else in her life like that, but put that thought out of her mind for the moment. The important thing was helping him through this, or at least trying to. Then she could decide where to go from here. “Okay. But it’s still worth a shot.” 

“I won’t be able to get close enough to him to knock him out,” Damon told her. 

“That’s okay. I will,” Elena said as she pulled in. 

Damon met her at the car. “If he hurts you, Elena…”

“He won’t,” she told him, wishing she was as confident as she was pretending to be. 

“I won’t be far,” he promised worriedly as he handed her a tranquilizer dart and she headed in.


	2. Chapter 2

Elena doubted her assertion that he wouldn’t hurt her when she found herself slammed against the wall, but then he pulled himself under control somewhat and she took that opportunity to dose him. As he hit the floor, Damon stepped into the room, proving that he hadn’t been far as he’d promised. She wondered if he was more worried about her or about how Stefan would feel if he’d hurt her before realizing it didn’t matter. 

“Sure you want to do this?” Damon asked. 

“I’m sure,” Elena said firmly. And not just about that either. Sure that she couldn’t go on like this. Worrying about Stefan losing it. Trying to keep his addiction under control. She had enough of that with Jeremy. She would fix what she broke and then she was out. 

Damon picked up Stefan and carried him down to the basement, locking him in the cell. “There’s no guarantee this is gonna work,” he warned her. 

“It has to,” she said with a sigh. 

“You coming?” Damon asked as he headed for the stairs. 

Elena shook her head. “I’m gonna stay here,” she said as she slid down the wall to sitting. She had to see this through. She looked curiously at Damon as he sat down across from her, leaning his head back against the wall. “Why?” 

“You’re gonna have to be more specific,” Damon said with a weary amusement. 

“Why do you care? I thought you promised him an eternity of misery or something,” Elena asked. 

“That doesn’t mean I ever stopped caring,” Damon admitted. “Wanting to torment him and wanting him broken or dead are very different things.”

“What did he ever do to deserve that in the first place?” Elena asked. Yesterday she wouldn’t have believed that he’d done anything to deserve it, but now she wasn’t so sure. 

Damon gave a harsh laugh. “Are you sure you want to hear that whole sad story?” He wasn’t even sure why he was considering telling it beyond the fact that he was just too tired and frustrated to fight anything right now. 

“Yes. I do.” 

Damon sighed heavily. “Fine. But you asked for it.” He took a moment to consider where to start. “I’ve learned in the last few months that a lot of it was based on lies so it’ll probably be easier to just tell it from my point of view at the time before clearing up all the misunderstandings.”

“Okay. That makes sense,” Elena agreed. Damon hadn’t been quite as bad as she’d heard in the last few months anyway. 

“It started when I came back home for a visit from the war. I was a soldier, you know…”

“No, I didn’t know that,” Elena admitted. 

“I came home as often as I could, but that last time was different. My family had taken in a boarder. A young orphaned woman named Katherine Pierce. During my visit, I fell in love with her and when it was time for me to leave, she wanted me to stay, so I did. I couldn’t deny her anything. I became a deserter and disappointed my father greatly, but I couldn’t leave her. When I found out that she was with Stefan too, it bothered me, but again, I could deny her nothing and she managed to convince me that there was nothing wrong with it.” 

“And that’s when you started hating him?” 

“Not exactly. I started hating him when he told me that he’d never cared about her in the first place,” Damon said with a grimace. “But that’s for later in the story. He started talking about telling our father, who happened to be a vampire hunter and hated them with a passion, what she was. I begged him not to. The next thing I knew, one night she had left my room, went to him, and she was captured.”

“He didn’t…”

“He came to me and told me that our father had dosed him with vervain without his knowledge so when she went to feed on him she was taken down. I believed him at the time and the two of us set out to rescue her, getting shot in the process. Since her blood was still in both of our systems, we both woke up later on in transition. He never wanted to be a vampire in the first place, but I had. Just to be with her though. When I learned that she was dead, I didn’t want that anymore and we made a pact that we would let it lapse. Let ourselves die instead of completely the change.” 

“But you changed your minds?” 

“He changed his mind,” Damon said hatefully. “He went and got in a fight with our father and killed him, completing his change. Then he came back to me and brought one of the girls from the town with him. He had compelled her to be compliant and tried to get me to join him. I wouldn’t though. I told him to just let me die. He insisted. He bit her to get the blood flowing and as soon as I smelled it, the hunger burned through me. I still refused though. I went to walk away, but I was so weak. Almost dead. Even without his newfound vampire strength I wouldn’t have been able to fight him. He grabbed the back of my head and forced my lips to her neck. The moment that her blood touched my lips, it was too late.”

“So he forced you to turn against your will?” Elena asked horrified. 

“Yes. He did. And it was then that he told me that he never loved Katherine. That was what made me doubt that he didn’t know he was getting her caught. Made me believe that he had just been playing with her, either to hurt me or to hurt her or both. He had taken the woman I loved away from me, then gotten her killed, and then forced me to live an eternity without her, so I promised him an eternity of misery just like what he sentenced me to.” 

“But that’s changed now?” Elena asked. 

“He told me that she’d compelled him to be with her and to drink her blood. I didn’t believe him until I learned that Katherine wasn’t who I thought she was. That she was just a conniving manipulative bitch who played us against each other and then faked her own death and took off when we stopped amusing her as much.” Damon shook off the mood, and realized that he’d revealed much more than he’d intended, so he quickly covered it up. “But anyway. What’s done is done. We should head up,” he said starting to get up, eager to put as much distance between himself and this conversation as he could. 

“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” Elena said sadly. 

“Do what?” Damon asked, raising an eyebrow at her. 

“Pretend not to care.”

Damon sighed. “And what’s the alternative, Elena? Tell the whole world exactly how to hurt me?” 

“You think I would hurt you?” she asked hurt. 

“It wouldn’t be the first time,” he said softly as he walked away. 

“Then why tell me the story at all?” she called after him. 

“I don’t even know, Elena,” he said wearily, as he stopped, but didn’t turn to look at her. 

“I think you do know, Damon,” she said as she got to her feet. “I think that you just wanted someone to understand.”

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” Damon said wearily as he continued his trek up the stairs before she could say anything else. Leaving her alone with Stefan right now wasn’t the smartest thing, but he just couldn’t deal with any more at the moment. He was glad when she followed him up which meant that he didn’t have to worry and just continued up to his room. 

Elena sighed as he walked away, but could admit that she needed some time to come to terms with everything she’d learned anyway. She had no idea what to say to him right now anyway so it might as well wait. She texted Jenna that she would be staying with Stefan tonight, not wanting to go home and leave either of them like this. She was glad that Jenna allowed her so much freedom. As long as she checked in, she could do what she wanted within reason. 

Elena dragged herself up to Stefan’s bed, not really liking what sleeping here symbolized at the moment, but not sure where else she could sleep. The antique couches weren’t bad for sitting, but terrible for sleeping and she knew that most of the other rooms in this place were dusty and unused and probably hadn’t had fresh sheets in forever, which meant that her only other option was climbing into bed with Damon which absolutely wasn’t happening. Stefan’s bed was the best option. At least for now. It was late and she was exhausted. She could think of something else for tomorrow if she stayed again.


	3. Chapter 3

Despite her exhaustion, Elena tossed and turned for most of the night. She couldn’t stop thinking about Damon’s story. She could definitely see why he hated Stefan. She realized that she didn’t even have any details of the things that Damon had done to Stefan over the years. She didn’t have details on any of the horrible things that Damon had supposedly done other than a few here and then she didn’t even know the reasons behind them. Even human killers got to tell their side of the story. They got their day in court, but she had judged Damon from the start based on someone else’s opinion without even getting the facts, much less Damon’s side of things. 

She thought back over all of their interactions since they’d met. He’d given her the creeps at first, but she could admit that it could have just as easily been meeting a brother that Stefan had never told her about after being caught in their house without permission and the way the vampires had a habit of popping up out of nowhere and scaring the daylights out of her. She couldn’t pinpoint anything he’d done or said that was creepy. Granted the information he’d given about Katherine could have been purposely trying to cause trouble between them or just him trying to make conversation. Now that she knew the whole story, she wouldn’t really blame him if it was just to cause trouble. If anything, Stefan had been the one to make that encounter creepy. 

The next time they’d really talked was when he and Caroline showed up for the dinner with Bonnie and Stefan. He’d been perfectly nice. Charming, polite. He’d even declined to give his side of the story with Katherine at that point because Stefan’s might differ. He was trying not to cause problems between them. He’d helped her clean up after dinner and they’d talked. He had been concerned about her happiness even. Those weren’t the actions of the monster he was made out to be. 

The time after that when he’d tried to kiss her was a total jerk move, but he had taken no for an answer at least, and she could understand where it was coming from. She looked just like Katherine and it had taken a little time for him to see that she wasn’t anything like her aside from looks. He had probably been trying to do to Stefan what Stefan had done to him. She didn’t like it and hated that he’d tried to put her in the middle like that, but she could understand it. He had apologized at least. Admitted that he had been acting out to punish Stefan. He’d been as honest as he could with her from the start, even telling her a little about the ‘family history’. 

Once she learned what he’d been doing to Caroline…that was when she started to really hate him and had even supported Stefan getting rid of him. She owed it to him to at least hear his side of the story though. If she’d been so wrong about everything else maybe she was wrong about this too. Or maybe not, but then he’d never claimed to be a good guy. He’d never pretended to be something he wasn’t. At least he hadn’t killed her like he had others. Then there was Vicki. Another thing that she didn’t have his side of the story on, but was still a horrible act. She had yelled at him, hit him even, and he’d let her. He was a vampire. He could have killed her in an instant, but he hadn’t. And then after all that, he offered to do what he could to fix it without prompting. He’d taken Jeremy’s memories and his suffering away. That showed some level of remorse. 

Then had been her car accident. He’d saved her. Protected her, and not just then, but a dozen times since. He got her to loosen up and have fun in a way that she hadn’t done since before her parents had died. She had needed that, and he seemed to have known that somehow. His evasiveness when she asked him why was proof enough of that. And then she had turned around and betrayed him. Gone along with Stefan lying to him, and lied to him herself. She’d felt completely justified by the fact that he was an irredeemable psychopath, but was he really? 

They way he put himself in her hands after that and didn’t even take the offer to compel the truth from her. He had still let himself trust her after that and she could see in his eyes how scared he was of that, but he did it anyway. Why? He had said that he didn’t compel her in Atlanta because he wanted it to be real. Had he been telling her that he wanted their trust to be real too? The whole mess with her birth mother was also confusing. He hadn’t known who she was when he was talking about it. All he knew what that Alaric wanted to kill him so he was riling him up. A dick move, but again, understandable. He hadn’t really done anything wrong with her either. She had asked him to turn her. He just gave her what she wanted. 

Overall the only conclusion that she came to was that Damon was an enigma. He was definitely not a good guy, but he wasn’t evil either. She had so many more questions for him, but getting him to answer them was going to be easier said than done. She hadn’t come to a conclusion yet by the time exhaustion finally claimed her. 

Damon laid in his bed staring at the ceiling, Elena’s last question ringing in his mind. Why /had/ he told her the story. Was she right that he just wanted her to understand? If so, why? It had never mattered to him before. He was the bad brother. The evil one. The villain. That’s just the way it was and no one had ever cared to look deeper and he’d never felt the need to fight the label. He liked it that way usually. People never expected better of him so he couldn’t truly disappoint them. 

He had disappointed her though. More than once. Somehow she managed to see something redeemable in him, even knowing what he’d done. Who he was. She had reached out to him when he was hurting and stood up to him when he was being cruel. She had even hit him. Knowing that he was a vampire and could kill her before she could blink. She had no hesitation with going toe to toe with him when she thought she was right. It was a novel experience for him. 

Then there was tonight. There had been something. When she was coming down the stairs like that he had felt something. More than he’d ever felt before and when they were dancing it just got stronger. Like he was being drawn to her against his will. He thought of all the times he’d stopped at nothing to protect her. How much it had hurt when she’d lied to him and betrayed him. How her trust was so important to him. The way he’d felt when he realized that he had hurt her biological mother and then bragged about it. 

When it dawned on him, Damon grabbed the first thing he could get his hands on, which happened to be the book on his nightstand, and threw it at the wall. Damnit. How the hell could he have fallen in love with her? How could he have let that happen? Again. No, he couldn’t even say again, because what he had felt for Katherine paled in comparison to this. He had fallen in love with his brother’s girl and he couldn’t even blame it on a compulsion. This was a disaster. 

He had no idea how long he’d been laying there before he gave up on sleep for the moment and got up. He couldn’t help looking in on Elena and brushed a hand down her cheek as she lay there fast asleep before he forced himself away and went to check on his brother, finding him awake and angry. Demanding to be let out. He was still high on the blood then. They wouldn’t get anywhere until enough of it had left his system for him to think clearly around it. He could have bled it out of him, but couldn’t bring himself to go there. Not now. 

He turned and went back upstairs. He would try again tomorrow. He poured himself a glass of bourbon and stared into the fire, trying to come to terms with everything and trying to figure out how to convince Elena to let him compel her to forget his entire ridiculously sentimental story. He ignored the fact that he could remove her necklace by force, compel her to forget and then give the necklace back and she would be none the wiser. At least now he knew why her trust mattered so much to him and why he was so loathe to break it. That didn’t make it any easier though.


	4. Chapter 4

When Elena woke up the next morning, her first stop was to check on Stefan. He was the reason she was here after all. She was surprised to find Damon already down there and winced at Stefan’s attitude. He was still insisting that he was fine and asking for human blood and wanting to be let out. Damon left to give them some time alone, but Elena couldn’t stand to be around Stefan like this, so she went up not long after, finding him thumbing through a book with a drink in his hand. “Damon, can we talk?” 

“Yes. We probably should. Why don’t you take your necklace off so we can chat properly?” Damon said putting the book down. He knew that wouldn’t work, but hoped it would at least start a discussion on the matter. 

“You can’t be serious,” she scoffed. 

“Listen, yesterday was a really crappy day. I was frustrated and out of sorts and I shouldn’t have told you any of that, so it’s better all around if we just pretend it never happened,” Damon tried reasoning with her. 

“Well what if I don’t want to forget?” she asked as she sat down next to him. 

“Well what if I don’t want your pity?” he asked snottily. 

“You’d rather be hated?” 

“Absolutely,” he said without hesitation. 

“That explains so much,” she said with a roll of her eyes. She knew that he could force the matter and there was nothing she could do about it, so she tried to think of a way to prevent it. “I don’t pity you, Damon.” 

“You don’t like me, Elena,” he pointed out. “And yet you’re still here. Talking to me instead of downstairs with your one true love. What is that if not pity?” 

Elena sighed. “I don’t know, but it’s not pity,” she told him before thinking of an idea. “How about we make a deal.”

“What kind of deal?” Damon asked suspiciously. 

“You promise to spend today and tonight answering all my questions openly and honestly, and if by morning I haven’t convinced you not to compel me to forget, then I’ll let you erase the whole thing. From the conversation last night on.” 

Damon narrowed his eyes at her as he considered it. Being open and honest for the day would be hard, but if he knew that he could compel her to forget it after, he could manage. There had been enough times that he had spilled his guts to complete strangers before compelling them to forget too. It wasn’t comfortable but it was doable. Still, he wanted a little more from this arrangement. “Letting me compel you is the price for my honesty. Your honesty in return is the price for me allowing you to attempt to talk me out of it.” 

Elena huffed a laugh. He was promising next to nothing for her honesty, but she didn’t mind promising him that anyway. “Okay. It’s a deal then.” 

“And I hold onto the necklace until the time comes, just so you can’t renege on the deal,” Damon added, holding out his hand. 

“Only if you promise not to compel me in any way until the agreed upon time.” When he nodded, she took the necklace off and handed it to him. 

“So why aren’t you downstairs with Stefan?” Damon asked, taking the first question of the day. 

“Can we possibly find me something to eat while we talk?” she asked hopefully, trying to buy some time with how to answer that. 

Damon shrugged and headed to the kitchen. They didn’t keep a lot of food here, but they did like to eat from time to time. Once she went to make a sandwich, he told her, “You can talk while you do that you know.”

“Yeah. Okay,” Elena said taking a deep steadying breath. “I just can’t stand being around him while he’s like this,” she admitted. 

“Why not?” Damon asked. 

“It’s just…he’s not who I thought he was,” she told him. “He always made it seem like that part of him was firmly in the past and he had changed, but now I know that was a lie. He may try and bury that part of him but it’s still there.”

“Then why are you here at all?” Damon asked curiously. 

“Because before I let him go, I at least need to help fix what I broke. I owe him that much,” Elena told him. 

“It wasn’t your fault, Elena,” Damon assured her. 

“We’ll just have to agree to disagree on that,” she said with a shrug as she went to take her sandwich outside, wanting some fresh air. She motioned him to follow and he did with an amused look on his face that faded as she asked her first question. “Why do you kill people?” 

Damon sat next to her in the grass and shrugged. “I don’t usually,” he told her. “When I first got here, I killed a few people to put the heat on Stefan. I was pissed at him for coming back here, now of all times. Right when I needed to be here to open the tomb. I wanted him to be run out of town. Then there was the time that I had been locked up and starved for a week. I couldn’t help it that time. I was in agony. Usually I just feed a little bit from people and don’t kill them.” 

“Like with Caroline,” she said distastefully. 

Damon shrugged. “Not really. Usually I grab a random person take a little drink and make them forget. Parties and clubs and the like are really good for that. No one cares about a little necking in the middle of the crowd.”

“Then why would you do all that to her?” 

“Because this town is complicated. Enough of the elders know about vampires and are on vervain and they tend to dose other people with it too. Feeding is tough here. When I found someone vervain free I didn’t want to let he opportunity get away from me. Part of it was also to get to Stefan since I realized I wasn’t going to be able to run him out of town. Since he was already with you and she was your friend, it was my way in.” He had promised her honesty and she would get it. Whether she liked it or not. “I did get rid of any pain with the compulsions too though. I wasn’t completely heartless.”

Elena sighed and shook her head. It made sense, but still didn’t make it right. She could admit that at least some of that was because Caroline was her friend. “And Vicki? Why would you do that to her?” 

“Which time?” he asked wryly. “The first time I bit her was when Stefan first got to town. Part of my attempt to make trouble for him and run him out. She wasn’t supposed to survive and I was shocked that she did. Then when I attacked her again during my little starving fit and she survived again, she impressed me with her strength, so I took her home, healed her up and tried to get to know her a bit. Stefan had stolen my daylight ring so I was confined to the house all day anyway and I was bored.”

“You turned her because you were bored?” Elena asked incredulously. 

“No, I turned her because she was so pathetic that I thought she would be better off that way,” Damon told her. “I mean, she was a complete disaster. She had zero self-esteem, drug problems, hated her life, felt trapped. I wanted to free her. I felt sorry for her.” 

“Oh,” Elena said sheepishly. At least his heart had been in the right place. “Do you ever feel guilty?” she asked as she laid down in the grass to soak up the sun. 

“If I let myself,” he told her, laying next to her. “It’s there.” 

“Is that why you offered to help Jeremy forget?” 

“Yeah,” Damon admitted. 

“So you let yourself feel guilty then? Why?” 

Damon winced. “I didn’t exactly /let/ myself that time. I couldn’t help it.”

“Why not? I mean, after everything else what was different about that one?”

“Because it hurt Jeremy which inadvertently hurt you,” he told her, really regretting his promise to be open and honest now. 

“Me?” she asked, turning her head to face him confusedly. “Why do I matter so much?” 

“Because somehow you managed to make me care about you,” he admitted, only because he knew he would be able to compel it away later. He turned his head to look back at her. “I don’t usually let myself get attached to humans.”

“But you did to me? Why?” 

“People usually react to me one of two ways. They fall for my surface charms and fawn over me, or they see me for what I really am and run screaming in terror. You didn’t do either. You saw something in me that no one else ever had.” 

“What’s that?” she asked confused. 

“Someone who could be saved.”


	5. Chapter 5

“What do you mean?” Elena asked.

“I’ve always been the ‘bad brother’,” Damon told her. “The…how did you put it? Self-serving psychopath with no redeeming qualities.” 

Elena winced at that. “I’m sorry, Damon. I shouldn’t have…”

“Whatever,” he waved her off before she could say more. “But the thing is, even though you thought that when you got mad at me, you saw more too. You saw the humanity in me no matter how deep I tried to hide it.” 

“Why did you try to hide it?” she asked. 

“Because it never mattered before,” he told her. “No one ever cared. It didn’t make me less of a monster to them. Sometimes it even made them think me more of one. Being a monster meant that no one ever expected anything better of me. I didn’t have to disappoint anyone just by being what I am.”

“And what are you?” she asked, wondering exactly what he meant by that. 

“I’m a vampire, Elena. A predator. Whether I choose to kill or not, it’s in my nature. And you know what? For the most part, I enjoy it.” 

Elena forced herself not to recoil at that and instead ask, “Why do you enjoy it?” 

“Because I’m free,” he said with a wistful smile. “I’m free to do what I want when I want. I don’t have to fit myself into a little box dictated by societal norms. I don’t have to hold down a crappy job to make ends meet and keep a roof over my head. I can drive two hundred miles an hour with the top down. I can run even faster. I can jump so high it feels like flying. I can go anywhere, do anything, and no one can stop me.” 

Elena huffed a laugh. “You know, take away the hurting and killing people part and that actually sounds kinda nice. Stefan always talked like being a vampire was so horrible.”

“You see what he’s like. Freedom doesn’t suit him. He needs to be controlled because he has so much trouble controlling himself,” Damon told her. 

“For a long time when we first got together, and even lately sometimes, his eyes do that thing when we get too close.” 

Damon nodded. “That’s him losing control.”

“I’ve never seen that happen to you though.” 

“Because I don’t have those issues with control. At least not in that way. My vampiric side is always under control.”

“Except when you’re starving,” she pointed out almost amused despite the macabre subject.

“Even then I had some control. Otherwise I would have headed straight to town where the largest concentration of people to feed on would be. Instead I headed for the woods and just happened to run across a group of druggies getting high.” 

“Okay. I get that,” Elena agreed, realizing that they’d gotten off track and thought back to figure out where. “So you hide your humanity so that no one holds you to human expectations?”

“And to keep people from realizing that it is possible to hurt me,” he admitted. 

“Like I have,” Elena said sadly. “I really am sorry…”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Just let me say it, Damon,” she said in irritation. 

Damon sighed, knowing it would make this so much harder, but didn’t have much choice. “Fine.”

“I’m sorry that I went along with Stefan with lying to you about the grimoire. You were trying to save someone you loved, and I offered to help and then betrayed you. You were right to be hurt. I’m also sorry for judging you unfairly based on Stefan’s word without getting to know you myself. I’m not sorry for telling you off when you’re being an ass though, like with what happened to Vicki and what you did to Caroline.” 

Damon chuckled. “And that’s why I love you. You challenge me in ways no one else would ever dare.” 

Elena blinked at him for a moment, wondering if he even realized what he’d said. “Why you what?” she asked as her heart raced. 

Damon’s eyes widened. “Crap,” he rolled to his feet. 

She jumped up and grabbed his hand before he could get far. “Damon, don’t.” she said. “Today is about being completely honest, remember?” 

Part of Damon wanted nothing more than to run, but her hand in his was like the strongest magnet keeping him in place. He comforted himself with the fact that he would be able to make her forget all this anyway. He hadn’t been ready to admit that yet. He had barely managed to admit it to himself but if it was going to be out there, it might as well be now when it could be fixed. “I just realized it myself, but…I love you, Elena. And it’s because I love you that I can’t be selfish with you. I don’t deserve you. And I wish that you didn’t have to forget this, but you do. Because I can’t let myself hurt you any more than I already have.” 

“I’m not Katherine, Damon,” Elena pointed out. The last she knew he had loved Katherine desperately and she knew that she looked like her, so she really hoped that wasn’t it. 

“Oh believe me, I know that,” Damon said with a self-deprecating huff. “You are nothing like her. She was always selfish and manipulative and I was an idiot to think that I was immune to that part of her personality. I realize now that what I felt for her was simple infatuation bordering on obsession. Nothing like…” he trailed off, unable to actually get the words out, but knowing that she would understand. 

“I…” Elena took a few deep breaths, no idea how to respond to that and trying to figure out how. 

“Can we just change the subject?” Damon asked hopefully. “I don’t really care to hear whatever platitudes you come up with to let me down easy. I know you don’t feel the same way so let’s just leave it at that until it can all be forgotten.” 

Elena nodded. She would allow that for now. At least until she figured out what to say to that and hopefully how she felt, though expecting to figure out her own feelings by tomorrow morning might be pushing it. It did give her a new reason for her questions. “Do you enjoy killing people?” 

“It depends on the reasons for it. Generally speaking, no. Which is why I don’t do it often.” 

“What kind of reasons make you enjoy it?” she asked curiously as she sat back down pulling him down with her before letting go of his hand and laying back down. 

“When they deserve it,” Damon told her as he laid back down next to her, glad that he wasn’t expected to look at her after that. “Or when it’s for revenge.”

“Revenge against Stefan?” 

“No. Those people are a means to an end.”

“So you didn’t enjoy killing them? You would feel guilty for it if you let yourself?” 

“No I didn’t enjoy it, and yes they add to the guilt that I keep beneath the surface.” 

“And how do you do that? Keep from feeling the guilt?” she asked hopefully. She wanted nothing more than to get rid of her own guilt. For killing her parents. For ruining Jeremy. For breaking Stefan. 

“It’s a vampire thing. We can usually keep from feeling things we don’t want to feel. The strongest things are all or nothing, but most of it we have more control over.”

“What do you mean all or nothing?” 

“We can completely turn off our humanity if we wanted to. A lot do. It’s easier that way. Makes life simpler.”

“But you haven’t.”

“No,” Damon shook his head. “I did for a while, but once I got it back, I swore never to do it again. It felt amazing at the time, but what I was missing…it wasn’t worth it to me. Yeah, you lose all the pain and guilt and grief, but you also lose all the good parts too. And no matter how much bad there is, the good parts make it worth it, even if it doesn’t always seem that way.” 

“And Stefan? Has he ever turned off his humanity?” 

Damon snorted. “That’s the first thing he did when he became a vampire. I spent a long time trying to bring him back from it before I just had to get away. Cleaning up his messes was killing me. I found someone else who could help him and passed it off. Eventually he did come back. For a while at least. That tends to be part of his falling off the wagon I mentioned. After the first few deaths the guilt gnaws at him enough that he turns it off which is when the body count really starts rising.”

“But you said that guilt can be blocked without turning off your humanity,” Elena said confused. 

“Only if it’s not too strong. Another reason I don’t kill often. And why it’s gotten the better of me a couple times since we met.”


	6. Chapter 6

“What happened to make you turn it off?” Elena asked, regretting it when she saw the look on his face. 

“There was this group. They hunted vampires, but not to kill them. To experiment on them. I was captured and spent five years being tortured and dissected alive, given only enough blood to keep me alive. I made friends with another of the prisoners and we made a plan to escape. With double rations, one of us could get strong enough to escape the next time they took us out for the parties where they showed off their research. For a year, he gave up almost all of his blood rations to me so that I could get out and take him with me. I got out, but I couldn’t get to him. They managed to lock the cage back before I could get to it and the bars were all soaked with vervain, so I couldn’t power through even if they hadn’t been as strong as they were. There was a fire…if I hadn’t left when I did, I would have died with him…but the only way I could leave was to turn it off.”

Elena couldn’t help but reach for his hand and lace their fingers together as he blinked the tears from his eyes. “I’m sorry, Damon. I can’t even imagine…how long were you held there?” 

“Five years,” he whispered, her hand in his grounding him and she gave his hand a squeeze. 

Elena took a few deep breaths as she used her free hand to wipe her own tears from her cheeks. She didn’t think she could have been that strong. Something like that was enough to screw anyone up. “Is that why you’re the ‘bad brother’. Because of what you did while your humanity was off?” 

Damon snorted. “I’ve always been the bad brother,” he told her. “Stefan took everything away from me and forced me to become a monster before turning off his humanity and abandoning me, but promising to make him as miserable as he made me makes me the bad brother. Despite that promise, I still spent years trying to pull him out of his hole and help him while he killed hundreds of people, but I’m still the bad brother. I reached out to him a dozen times, trying to make things right between us, always to get pushed away humanity or not, but I’m the bad brother. He goes on binges every few decades where hundreds of people die in his wake of destruction, but because I kill a few people here and there, it makes me the bad brother. Like his few decades of pacifism make up for everything else he does and make him a saint.” 

Elena rolled to her side, still holding his hand. “You’re not a bad brother, Damon. You’re not bad at all.” 

Damon rolled his eyes as he turned to face her. “Right. I’m a cuddly kitten, am I?” 

“I wouldn’t go that far,” Elena said with a chuckle. “I wouldn’t call you good, but that doesn’t mean you’re bad either.”

“Right, it’s getting late. We should get you some dinner,” Damon said pulling his hand away and getting up to go inside. 

Elena couldn’t deny that she was hungry, but she hated leaving it like that. She had a feeling that this issue would be the key to whether or not her memories stayed intact. Still, there was one other question she needed an answer to before she got back to that. “Have you ever successfully compelled me before?” 

Damon sighed as they sat at the table. “Once. We met once before. The night of the accident actually. I didn’t have anything to do with the accident though and was long gone before it happened. I swear,” he told her, knowing what conclusion she would jump to. 

“Can I please have that memory back? At least for now?” 

“I don’t see why not. The main reason I took it was so that no one would know I was around yet,” he said with a shrug before compelling her to remember. 

She smiled at the memory as it played in her mind before she said, “I get why you don’t usually let people see this side of you, but I’m glad you’re letting me.”

“Only because you won’t remember any of this tomorrow,” Damon said with a smirk. 

“You really want me to go back to thinking of you as a monster?” she asked pointedly. 

“It’s better than your pity,” he reminded her. 

“And I’m telling you that I don’t pity you, Damon.” 

“You were holding my hand, Elena,” he said pointedly as though it were all the proof he needed. 

“Okay, I’ll tell you what. I know the deal was that you couldn’t compel me at all until morning, but I’ll make an exception, but only for you to ask me that,” Elena told him. 

Damon considered for a long moment before agreeing. This was a lot like the situation where she offered to let him compel the truth, but it was also a lot different too. This wasn’t a matter of trust. Not really. It was a matter of breaking through denial. He leaned close and brought up his compulsion power. “What do you feel for me?” he asked her. 

“I’m falling in love with you,” she replied in a dazed voice. 

“Crap. That’s not what I meant. I mean…do you pity me?” he managed to keep his compulsion power going during his mini-freak out thankfully or he might never have gotten to the question he actually wanted to know. 

“No,” she replied still dazed. 

He let the power fade and quickly said, before she had a chance to berate him. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize that wording it that way the first time would do that. As far as I’m concerned it never happened.” He couldn’t even consider what it meant right now, too worried about her hating him for it. 

Elena took a few deep breaths to calm herself down. She knew that he didn’t mean to do that, even without his babbling apology. What it revealed though was what had her so off-balance. She reached out and took his hand. “It’s okay, Damon. I’m glad it happened.”

“You are?” he asked in shock. 

“There’s always been some kind of connection between us ever since we met. For the first time in the road or the time we met here. Yesterday when we were dancing, it was even stronger. I didn’t know what it meant. Or maybe I was lying to myself. Trying not to feel it because of everything I didn’t know about you and I’ve been trying to figure out my feelings all day, but now I know, and I’m glad I know. And I’m glad you know too.” 

Damon closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths before he said, “It doesn’t change the fact that I’m bad for you, Elena. I don’t deserve you. I make bad decisions that hurt you.” 

“And you make good ones that help me,” she told him. “You’ve protected me and helped me a lot more than you’ve hurt me. As far as not deserving me, don’t you think that’s a decision I should make? Maybe you are bad for me, or maybe you’ll end up being the best thing that ever happened to me.” 

“Elena…please…” Damon begged. He couldn’t take having this just to turn around and lose it. If she actually said it, he didn’t think he would have the strength to walk away. 

“Damon, I…”

“We should go check on Stefan,” he cut her off abruptly, getting up from the table. It was both to stop what she was about to say and to remind her about him. 

Elena rushed after him and grabbed his hand to stop him. “In a few minutes,” she said. She wasn’t going to let him run from this. “I know what you’re trying to do and it’s not going to work. Do you realized what you actually compelled of me that night we met?” 

“What do you mean?” Damon asked confused. 

“You told me that you wanted me to get everything I wanted while you were compelling me. I know you didn’t mean to, but what ended up happening was that I fell for the first person I met that could give me those things. It was never real with Stefan. It was because of your compulsion.” 

“But…I don’t…how do you know?” Damon stammered. 

“Because the moment you broke that compulsion, I felt nothing for him anymore. Even before that, it never felt real. It felt almost like some fairytale that I was just along for the ride. You and me, Damon…that’s real. It’s always been you. I just couldn’t see it before,” she told him. 

Damon looked at her for a long moment before pulling her into a kiss. Her hands immediately tangled in his hair as she kissed him back for all she was worth. Damon moaned as he backed her against the wall, and she pulled him tightly as he kissed down her neck. Just when she thought this was going to keep going though, he pulled away abruptly panting for breath. “We can’t do this. Not like this.”


	7. Chapter 7

“What do you mean?” she asked. 

“It’s too forced,” Damon told her. “Things like this should happen naturally.”

“What are you saying?” she asked worriedly. 

“I’m going to compel away your memories of today…wait just hear me out,” Damon stopped her from protesting. “I’ll leave last night’s conversation and won’t replace the compulsion from the first night we met. I’ll try to be less closed off and let you get to know me the right way and time to unentangle yourself from my brother. The day you tell me you love me, I’ll give all this back. Okay?” 

Elena considered that for a long moment. She hated the idea of losing all this, but she could see why he wanted it. He wanted to be sure. He needed to know that it was real and that she wasn’t just swept up in the emotions of the day and his uncharacteristic openness. “If you really think that’s best, then I’ll accept it, but I’m holding you to your promise to give it back.”

“I do, and I will,” Damon told her with a smile. 

“You realize that I’ll be yelling at you for the compulsion on the night we met though right?” she pointed out amusedly. 

“Oh, I know,” Damon said with a chuckle. “You ready?” 

“In a minute,” she told him before leaning up for a long slow kiss. “Just to tide us both over.” She brushed her hand down his cheek, smiling at the dazed look on his face before he wiped it off. “I’m ready now.” 

Damon looked deep into her eyes as he compelled away her memories of everything since this morning, giving her a lazy day reading a book that she’d read a dozen times already. He also gave her a conversation about compulsions in general that led to him releasing the compulsion from the night they met. Just before he ended the compulsion power, he clasped her necklace back around her neck, and took a step back. 

True to her prediction, she yelled at him for compelling her, and still held true to her assertion from before that it was the only reason she had loved Stefan. “I am so sorry, Elena. I didn’t mean for that to happen.”

“Maybe you should start thinking before you compel people,” she snapped before storming out. 

Damon let out a heavy breath and plopped down on the couch, wondering if he would ever see her again. Now that they didn’t have the connection through Stefan, there was no reason for them to be around each other. He knew that this was the right thing though. If he never saw her again it would be for the best. At least he couldn’t hurt her any more that way. He took a few minutes to feel sorry for himself before picking himself up and heading for his next difficult conversation of the night. 

Explaining to his brother that his entire relationship had been the unintended consequence of a well meaning compulsion had not gone well. He hadn’t really had much choice though after the first thing out of Stefan’s mouth had been to ask where Elena was. On the plus side, the anger was helping to pull him out of his guilt spiral and he was drinking up the animal blood as the last of the human blood worked it’s way out of his system. It would still be a few days before he was okay to come out, which Damon could only think was a good thing. At least it gave him some time to cool down. 

It was two days later before his routine was interrupted by the doorbell, and he was surprised to see Elena standing there. “Can I come in?” she asked pointedly when he just gaped at her for a moment. 

“Yeah. Of course. Sorry. Come on in,” Damon said stepping away from the door. “I didn’t expect to see you again so soon…or ever.” 

Elena sighed. “Look, Damon. You screwed up, yeah, but you’re still my friend and your heart was in the right place.” 

“I really am sorry, Elena. And you know that’s not something I say often,” Damon told her. 

“I know. And I will forgive you. I just need some time to get past it okay?” 

“Yeah. I get it.” 

“And part of that involves dealing with things with Stefan. If he’s up to it, of course,” Elena told him. 

“He is. He’s been wanting to talk to you too. I told him about the compulsion thing so you can at least skip that painful part of the talk,” Damon told her. 

“Okay. Thank you, Damon. I really wasn’t looking forward to that,” she told him as she headed for the stairs down to the basement. Damon let her go by herself. Unless she asked for his presence, he would give them their privacy to deal with this. Elena took a few deep breaths at the bottom of the stairs before she stepped in front of the door. “How are you doing?” she asked him. 

“I’m okay,” Stefan told her. “You don’t have to be here you know. Damon told me about the compulsion. That you never really cared about me.” 

“It wasn’t that I didn’t care, Stefan,” she said sympathetically. “I just…didn’t love you. That doesn’t mean we can’t still be friends.” 

Stefan sighed and nodded. It may not have been real for her but it had been for him. This was just another on the long list of things his brother had done to hurt him though, and if he was to be believed, this one hadn’t even been intentional. “Friends sounds good,” he told her. If nothing else she knew their secret anyway so they might as well be friends. 

“Good. Then as your friend, I’m asking if you need anything and how you’re dealing with things.” 

“Damon has been keeping me fed with animal blood, so I don’t really need anything. As far as dealing…I’m getting there.” 

“If you need someone to talk to…” 

“Thanks, Elena. But I’d really rather not,” Stefan told her. 

“Okay. I get that. But you can always call me if you need to,” she told him and when she got a nod and nothing else, she headed back upstairs. 

“He doing okay?” Damon asked. 

Elena smiled at him. “Yeah. He said you’ve been taking good care of him.”

“It’s the least I could do after my latest screw-up,” Damon said with a shrug. 

“Well if you need any help, I’m here. I’m sorry I took off like that the other day. I just really needed some time to come to terms with things.” 

“No hey I get it. It’s all good,” Damon assured her. 

“Well I should get going. I just wanted to stop by on my way to the school. I’m supposed to help build the Miss Mystic float for the founders day parade. If I don’t make it, I get the wrath of Caroline.” 

“Wouldn’t want that,” Damon chuckled. “Have fun.”

The next day he heard from Elena again, she wanted him to meet her at school in the history classroom. He didn’t hesitate to go of course. “Damon. Thanks for coming,” Alaric said as he came in. 

“Sorry I’m late. Dog ate my…never mind,” the joke fell flat at the mood in the room. “What’s with all the furrowed brows?” 

“I saw Isobel last night,” Ric told him. 

“Isobel’s here?” Ric nodded. “In town?” After realizing how completely useless Ric was in getting information, he finally asked a question he could answer. “What does she want?”

“She wants to see me, Damon,” Elena said nervously. 

“Alaric is supposed to arrange a meeting. We don’t know why or what she wants,” Stefan explained. 

“You don’t have to see her if you don’t want to,” he told Elena seriously. 

“I don’t really have a choice,” Elena said worriedly, more than a little touched that he had been the only one concerned with what she wanted here. 

“She’s threatening to go on a killing spree,” Ric told him. 

“Oh,” Damon said considering for a moment. “I take it that’s…/not/ okay with you guys?”

“I wanna do it,” Elena spoke up before anything else could be said. “I want to meet her. If I don’t, I know I’ll regret it.”

Unfortunately, during the meeting, both Damon and Alaric had been banned from the building, leaving her with just Stefan as backup. That didn’t keep Damon from pacing outside, as Ric tried to keep him from busting in and making everything go to hell. When Damon found out how much Isobel had upset Elena though, there was no one there to stop him from going after her. 

He found her easily. He had taught her all her tricks after all. He kept busy with her little minion for a while waiting for her to get home and then toyed with her long enough to get all the information he could before getting to the point of the visit. He pinned her to the floor by her neck. “Now that I have your attention, listen up. You do not come into my town and threaten the people I care about. Going after Elena? BAD move. You leave her alone or I will rip you to bits because I do believe in killing the messenger. You know why?” He leaned down and whispered menacingly. “Because it sends a message.” She tried to sit up but he slammed her back down. “Katherine wants something from me? You tell that little bitch to come get it herself.”


	8. Chapter 8

Elena had other ideas though. She apparently patched things up with Bonnie and the two of them, along with Stefan were waiting for him when he got home. He was very much not on board with the plan and more than a little skeptical of Bonnie’s skills, even after her demonstration. When Elena asked him to trust her though, he was powerless under her gaze and handed over the device with a sigh. Giving it to Isobel went relatively well, at least. Right up until the point where Elena asked her, “You took a chance with Damon. How did you know he would give it to me?” 

“Because he’s in love with you,” Isobel replied. Damon shifted uncomfortably as her eyes cut up to him and he looked away, only for his eyes to meet Stefan’s who also pointedly looked away. Still, everyone walked away without bloodshed which was really the best he could ask for. 

Stefan offered to take Elena home which she gratefully accepted. She had no idea what to say to Damon right now. He hadn’t denied it which said everything as far as she was concerned. She could understand him not wanting to say anything in front of Isobel and her cronies, but he would have said so once she was gone or even offered to drive her home himself if he was going to deny it. The drive with Stefan was still uncomfortably silent, but at least the elephant sharing the car with them wasn’t quite as big. She had a lot to think about. 

She managed to make enough small talk with Jenna to avoid suspicion, before she went to bed, but sleep was a long time coming. She instinctively reached up to fiddle with her necklace like she always did when she was deep in thought before remembering that she’d given it back to Stefan a few days ago and replaced it with a vervain bracelet. She dropped her hands back to the bed with a sigh as her brain ran a mile a minute. 

They definitely had a connection and she would by lying if she said that she didn’t have feelings for him. But this was Damon. He did have his good qualities, but he was still a psychopath. She remembered his story about how he was turned and she could understand why he turned out the way he did, but could she really let herself fall for him? She had to admit that he’d been better lately. Was that because of her? Or was it all an act?

She avoided him for the next week and a half, and Stefan too outside of school, though they had to go to the Mystic Day parade together since he had been her official escort at the pageant so they would be on the float together. She still hadn’t come to a conclusion about Damon before all hell broke loose after the parade. She had been talking it over with Stefan when he suddenly hit the ground holding his head. Ric helped them into the subway and when she learned what was happening, she quickly barreled back out, calling for Damon. 

She hadn’t found him yet when she caught signs of the fire and suddenly she knew that’s where he was. She went straight for the door, only to be stopped by Bonnie. Stefan raced past her and Elena could only pray that Stefan could get to him because Bonnie wasn’t letting her go. At least she was chanting a spell, so hopefully it would be one that would help them. When she stopped chanting was when Elena started getting scared. Before she could get too worked up though, the door opened and Stefan came out half dragging a coughing Damon. 

Elena rushed to his side, trying uselessly to help support him. “Oh thank god. Damon are you okay?” she asked worriedly. 

“I’ll live,” he croaked through his coughs. 

“I’m sorry,” she told him as they lowered him to sit on the ground and Bonnie took off. “I’m so sorry.”

“For what?” Damon asked weakly as Stefan moved away to give them the illusion of privacy. 

“I thought we could trust Bonnie. You trusted me and I let you down,” she told him with tears welling up in her eyes. 

“S’okay,” he told her. “Not your fault.”

“You almost died, Damon. And I’ve been avoiding you and I’m sorry for that too. I just…I needed to think and I was scared and I just…I almost lost you Damon.”

“I’m okay, Elena,” he assured her, placing his hands to her cheeks and forcing her to look at him. “I’m okay.” 

“I love you, Damon,” she breathed out. “I almost lost you before I could tell you that I love you.” It didn’t matter anymore if it was a good idea or not. She couldn’t help it. 

Damon grinned brightly. Almost dying was more than worth this. He leaned forward and captured her lips in a searing kiss which she returned gratefully, but they were interrupted by Stefan before things could get too heated. “We really should get out of here,” he pointed out. 

“Yeah. Okay. I’m coming with you,” she told them, glad that Stefan had picked her up for the parade so she wouldn’t be leaving her car. 

Damon nodded and tossed her the keys. “You drive. I’m not quite up to snuff yet.” During the trip, Damon reached out and took her hand, pulling it to his lips for a kiss, getting a smile from her as she squeezed his hand. Damon got a text from Stefan that he wouldn’t be home and sent back a quick thanks, glad that his brother was giving them some privacy to work this out tonight. 

Damon waited until they got home and he had a bag of blood in him and was all healed up again before he turned to Elena and brushed a hand down her cheek. “I need you to take off your bracelet for a minute.”

“What? Why?” Elena asked worriedly stepping away from him. 

“Do you trust me?” he asked gently, reaching slowly for her wrist. Elena took a deep breath before nodding and letting him take the bracelet off. He looked deep into her eyes and compelled her, “Remember.” 

Elena closed her eyes and tried to catch her breath as she was bombarded with an entire day’s worth of memories. She barely felt Damon’s arm around her waist helping her to the couch to sit down. It ended up taking her about ten minutes to process all those memories before she opened her eyes with a grin. The last of her reservations about this relationship died with the memories that she got back and she grabbed him in another searing kiss, and this time there was nothing stopping them. 

“I love you, Damon,” Elena said again as she curled up to his side while they both panted for breath. 

“I love you too, Elena,” he whispered, kissing her softly as he pulled the covers up over their naked bodies. 

“And I still meant what I said before,” she said sleepily, resting her head on his chest. “You’re not the bad brother.”

“But I’m still bad for you,” he couldn’t help but say. 

“I don’t think so,” she told him, pressing a kiss to his chest. “You said before that I wanted a love that consumes me. Passion, adventure and a little danger. Seems to me that you were right and all those things can be found right here with you.” 

Damon smiled and leaned his head against hers. “And I want you to get everything you’re looking for,” he whispered. 

“Then no more trying to run away from this,” Elena slurred, losing her hold on wakefulness. 

“I’ll be here as long as you’ll have me,” Damon said softly pressing a kiss to her head, but she was already too far into sleep to respond, and Damon fell asleep with a smile on his face for the first time in as long as he could remember.


End file.
